


Optimism

by mellarosa



Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: Basically, but this is Jensen's life, cos civil war is not great kiddos, even though some sad stuff happens, i mean its just talking abt how katie is a happy lady, jensen and andersmith would be cute childhood friends, katie's life, reds n blues kinda show up at the end
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-15
Updated: 2017-01-15
Packaged: 2018-09-17 14:28:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9329009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mellarosa/pseuds/mellarosa
Summary: She used to be called Katie, and she liked that. Now she's called Jensen and she likes that too. She's never been called Katherine but she wouldn't really mind that either. She's a pretty happy person .





	

**Author's Note:**

> i dont know what this is i wrote it rlly fast but i actually really like jensen ok? Ok

Katherine Jensen was born on Chorus, raised on Chorus. She's never even broken atmo. She's really quite proud of this fact, too. While the other soldiers complain about being stuck on this backwater hellhole of a planet on those days where kids don't come back, where they're low on food and an MRE gets split up four ways, where another general dies and they're stuck wondering when they're next-

 

-well, Jensen just smiles a little and offers Andersmith her meal, because he's much bigger than she is. He always says no, the noble idiot.

 

Jensen doesn't want to die for her planet because she doesn't want to die. She's very fond of being alive, even though most people wouldn't really think of life on Chorus as ‘living’. 

 

But Jensen was born smiling and she'll keep smiling.

 

\--

 

Back when Jensen was still called Katie on a regular basis, she had a mother and a father and a little sister. 

 

Katie's father had rheumatism, which had been his official reason for not leaving to fight in the Great War. The real reason, of course, had been that the war had seemed so unimportant and far away. The only change that actually affected Chorusians was that the scattered few UNSC officials left.

 

Chorus was, after all, on the very edge of civilized space. It's inhabitants were, as a whole, poor, and though educated and perfectly intelligent, would have been considered hicks had anyone bothered to actually land on the planet. 

 

But no, Mr Jensen stayed home, and worked the lousy desk job that was the only thing he could manage with his rheumatism (which really was a problem). Mrs Jensen worked at the little local library three days a week. And Katie went to school.

 

Katie went to school and learned all about the history of Chorus. How it began as a little colony, filled with people who were poor, with people who needed another chance, with people looking for a simple life.

 

Katie learned how the settlers had quickly discovered an abundance of abandoned alien artifacts, temples, and the like. The UNSC rushed in, overwhelming the new unsteady colonists, and spent three years combing over, studying, and documenting the wealth they found. But eventually the UNSC sighed and admitted it was all old, broken, and completely useless. They grabbed a few samples, left a few officials, and flew back to wherever they came from.

 

And the newly christened Chorusians shrugged, and went on with their lives.

 

Katie learned and she loved her planet even more. Because Katie was a happy girl, optimistic to the extreme, even as other children snubbed her lisp and her braces and her freckles, as children are wont to do. 

 

Even as they told her she wasn't allowed to sit with them, or that she had to be the scary alien whenever they played house, Katie smiled and shrugged off the hate easily. She also messed with their datapads so the tech would lock and prevent them from getting in, because Katie was smart, too. 

 

When Mrs Jensen explained to little Katie that she'd have a sister, Katie was happy, but not as happy as she was when she held Hannah in her arms the first time. Hannah was real, was a scrunchy pink mess with huge brown eyes and a puff of curly brown hair. 

 

Katie squealed in joy and almost dropped Hannah. Luckily, Mrs Jensen was used to such clumsiness and neatly saved the baby.

 

From then on, Katie made it her mission to care about Hannah. Because Mrs Jensen tried, really, but money was tight and things were getting bad. The Great War was over, but the UNSC had abandoned them. Oh, sure, Chorus’ frantic messages would get replies, bug they'd be vague, noncommittal things from some low ranking grunt with no power. Clearly, Chorus wasn't on the top of anyone's priorities list. 

 

So Chorusians shrugged and built their own government. A government that not everyone agreed with.

 

While Mrs Jensen took on odd jobs for money and Mr Jensen started going to the bar after work, Katie got Hannah dressed and fed. 

 

She didn't mind. Not one bit, because Katie thought Hannah was the best thing in the world.

 

Hannah still had big brown eyes, and after a brief bald period, had two big pigtail puffs of curls on either side of her head. Her skin had gone tan from sun and a multitude of freckles had bloomed everywhere. Hannah even had a lisp, though hers was more of a toddler's lisp than a habitual one. Katie was incredibly happy, because the two of them matched. True, Hannah was chubby where Katie was incredibly skinny - all knees and elbows and a stork neck - and Katie wore her hair in a ponytail, but they were sisters and Katie knew that was the coolest thing on the planet.

 

Hannah always insisted on wearing shorts, even when it was cold. All but one of Hannah’s shirts had flowers on them. Hannah had a pair of yellow galoshes that she'd always seem to misplace on the way home from the park and Katie would have to turn back and find them again. And Hannah had a sister who thought the world of her.

 

When Mr and Mrs Jensen argued long into the night, voices acerbic, forgetting to be quiet, Katie read Hannah stories with funny voices and sang songs that would never get her into a choir. 

 

“We need to get off planet!”

 

“How!? I'm sorry, have you been hiding a spaceship and a million credits from me?”

 

“For gods sakes, Bethany, can't you see this whole planet is diving? If we stay we'll get murdered for not being on someone's side, or even for just being in the way!”

 

“Chorus is our home, and I won't abandon it, even if there was some plausible way we could!”

 

“If we stay, we will die, Beth!”

 

“And Seamus the squirrel laughed, because he had hidden his acorn,” read Katie, and grinned because maybe Mommy and Daddy were sad but Hannah was bouncing on her lap with excitement.

 

Mr Jensen didn't come home one day. Mrs Jensen scowled and broke some dishes and they couldn't afford to send Katie to her old school anymore, so she walked a whole town over to the free public one. She smiled on the walk because it was cool to have new friends.

 

Therefore, Katie wasn't home when the bombs hit. She never learned who sent them. Didn't seem to matter much. 

 

Katie was sad, yes. Of course she was. And the orphanage they put her in was full to the brim and getting fuller every day. But she didn't give up, like some of the other kids did. She'd see them, looking out of windows and lying in beds, eyes dull. She didn't blame them, but she wouldn't be them. Hannah was gone, Mommy was gone, and Daddy probably was too. But that would have to be okay, so it was okay.

 

John agree with her. John's family was dead too. His oldest brother hadn't ever come home from the Great War and the rest of them had died in bombings, like hers. John heard Katie explain why she was smiling to a bitter adult. He marched up and solemnly backed her up.

 

Katie and her new friend John played outside and he didn't make fun of her lisp and she didn't make fun of his odd formality and they decided to be bestest friends forever. John would talk adults into letting Katie fix their cars for them - because even young, Katie was good at engines - and Katie would steal books for John because the library was gone too. 

 

More and more people were dying, and though no one had ever officially declared war it had happened. It was all a mess, and it made Katie and John sad because they loved Chorus, they loved their home, and it was being torn apart. But they still smiled when they watched a movie or one of them found candy.

 

The word got out. The New Republic was taking teenagers for soldiers. It made sense - there were practically no adult civilians left, having all been drafted or dragged into the war. And the News needed more men.

 

Besides, soldiers got armor. It was safer to be in the army then to not be, so Katie became Private Jensen and John became Private Andersmith.

 

Katie didn't want to die for her planet, but Jensen would fight to end the war.

 

Other soldiers asked her why we was always smiling, the lanky teenager with a lisp and a buzzed head, who had a tendency to crash cars she'd just fixed. Jensen just laughed and asked why not. 

 

When the Reds and Blues came, she was assigned to Captain Simmons’ squad. Which seemed dumb since the poor man couldn't seem to talk to a female without breaking down and his whole squad were girls, but Jensen wasn't one to question General Kimball’s orders. 

 

The Sim Troopers were really cool, anyways. True, they turned out to be huge dorks, but that really only made them even better in Jensen’s opinion. Plus, Simmons picked her to be his lieutenant and that was just so awesome.

 

Okay true they left her behind, but they left behind the other lieutenants (Andersmith was a lieutenant too wasn't that neat? And Bitters and Palomo were totally her new friends. Even if Bitters said no and Palomo was an idiot) too, and it really was because the Captains didn't want them to die.

 

Then Felix said Simmons and the rest were dead, and that… that sucked, but Jensen squared her shoulders and they went to fight.

 

Besides, it all turned out great when the Sims were alive - and there were more. And Freelancers too! Plus, the Feds weren't actually evil. A lot of people were mad that the News and Feds were working together, but Jensen remembered Hannah and remembered that no one knew which side had bombed her house. So Jensen smiled and offered a Fed a water bottle.

 

Sure, Wash made them run laps for hours and Carolina was really really scary, but Jensen was incredibly happy. They had a real enemy to fight, and as soon as Felix and Locus and their men were down, everything would be over. Chorus would be safe.

 

And then it was!! It totally was, and maybe Jensen held Palomo’s hand on the Pelican ride to save the Reds and Blues but she could feel it, could feel that bursting optimism that would mean everything would be okay. Andersmith nodded to her and Bitters scowled and pretended he wasn't worried and everything was going to turn out well.

**Author's Note:**

> A quick timeline:
> 
>  
> 
> Jensen was five when Hannah was born, eight when she died. Jensen met Andersmith a few months later. War was never formally declared and bad shit had been happening for a while but things started to get truly nasty about a year after that. Jensen and Andersmith joined up when she was 15 and he was a month from 18. The Reds and Blues crash twelve years after Hannah’s birth, which coincidentally happened to be around the first time someone died for the ‘cause’. 
> 
>  
> 
> A quick note: 
> 
> Oh my stars is that a hint of a hetero, and normal, ship at the end? I know I know how boring but hey fight me Palomo and Jensen were totally holding hands on the Pelican ride and there is a screenshot to back me up
> 
> This is technically in the same 'verse as 'it takes a village (or an army)' but u seriously don't need one to read the othed


End file.
